“But it is a hardship,” men say, “to do without our customary pleasures—to fast, to feel thirst and hunger.”
These are indeed serious when one first abstains from them. Later the desire dies down, because the appetites themselves which lead to desire are wearied and forsake us; then the stomach becomes petulant, then the food which we craved before becomes hateful. Our very wants die away. But there is no bitterness in doing without that which you have ceased to desire.
Moreover, every pain sometimes stops, or at any rate slackens; moreover, one may take precautions against its return, and, when it threatens, may check it by means of remedies. Every variety of pain has its premonitory symptoms; this is true, at any rate, of pain that is habitual and recurrent. One can endure the suffering which disease entails, if one has come to regard its results with scorn.
But do not of your own accord make your troubles heavier to bear and burden yourself with complaining. Pain is slight if opinion has added nothing to it; but if, on the other hand, you begin to encourage yourself and say, “It is nothing—a trifling matter at most; keep a stout heart and it will soon cease”; then in thinking it slight, you will make it slight. Everything depends on opinion; ambition, luxury, greed, hark back to opinion. It is according to opinion that we suffer.
A man is as wretched as he has convinced himself that he is. I hold that we should do away with complaint about past sufferings and with all language like this: “None has ever been worse off than I. What sufferings, what evils have I endured! No one has thought that I shall recover. How often have my family bewailed me, and the physicians given me over! Men who are placed on the rack are not torn asunder with such agony!”
However, even if all this is true, it is over and gone. What benefit is there in reviewing past sufferings, and in being unhappy, just because once you were unhappy? Besides, everyone adds much to his own ills, and tells lies to himself. And that which was bitter to bear is pleasant to have borne; it is natural to rejoice at the ending of one’s ills.
These are indeed serious when one first abstains from them. Later the desire dies down, because the appetites themselves which lead to desire are wearied and forsake us; then the stomach becomes petulant, then the food which we craved before becomes hateful. Our very wants die away. But there is no bitterness in doing without that which you have ceased to desire.
Moreover, every pain sometimes stops, or at any rate slackens; moreover, one may take precautions against its return, and, when it threatens, may check it by means of remedies. Every variety of pain has its premonitory symptoms; this is true, at any rate, of pain that is habitual and recurrent. One can endure the suffering which disease entails, if one has come to regard its results with scorn.
But do not of your own accord make your troubles heavier to bear and burden yourself with complaining. Pain is slight if opinion has added nothing to it; but if, on the other hand, you begin to encourage yourself and say, “It is nothing—a trifling matter at most; keep a stout heart and it will soon cease”; then in thinking it slight, you will make it slight. Everything depends on opinion; ambition, luxury, greed, hark back to opinion. It is according to opinion that we suffer.
A man is as wretched as he has convinced himself that he is. I hold that we should do away with complaint about past sufferings and with all language like this: “None has ever been worse off than I. What sufferings, what evils have I endured! No one has thought that I shall recover. How often have my family bewailed me, and the physicians given me over! Men who are placed on the rack are not torn asunder with such agony!”
However, even if all this is true, it is over and gone. What benefit is there in reviewing past sufferings, and in being unhappy, just because once you were unhappy? Besides, everyone adds much to his own ills, and tells lies to himself. And that which was bitter to bear is pleasant to have borne; it is natural to rejoice at the ending of one’s ills.
—from Seneca, Moral Letters 78
I might assume that the fear of pain is the biggest threat I face, and yet I will often willingly endure a pain in the hope of a future pleasure. But what if that pleasure is not to come, and the gratification of the senses is forever denied me? What would be the point to a life without the reward of such a satisfaction?
My problem is a confusion about causes and consequences: let me remember to judge the value of the pleasure by the action from which it proceeds. Though the man in the street is unlikely to have heard of David Hume, it is his disordered view of the human person that haunts our contemporary attitudes, such that we take reason to be a slave of the passions, and we measure the good by whatever indulges our subjective desires.
Once I center upon the virtues, with the perfection of my nature as a creature of mind and of will, I am then able to find a genuine joy in the best form of character. Let the appetites have their say, and then let an understanding have the final say. Our cravings would like to trick us into thinking that they must always be satiated, while an awareness of our nature gently reminds us why the good life asks to receive so very little, and it can tolerate so very much.
With a touch of patience and a broader perspective, observe how many of the things we insist that we need are nothing more than diversions, far more likely to become curses instead of blessings. Desire, like pain, has a way of burning out quickly, and then we see how foolish our petty obsessions have really been.
The slightest practice in self-discipline proves why no luxury is ever a necessity; our frenzied longing only proves how we are grasping for substitutes to our own inner worth.
Today I was frustrated when the internet connection went out, and yesterday I grumbled about a delayed Amazon order. And yet when I was younger, neither option was even on the table, and I still managed to happily make it through my day. The want is the result of a mindless habit, and a conscious adjustment in my thinking about meaning and value has the power to correct such bad habits.
Most pleasures are superficial, most pains are bearable, and a commitment to conscience is what makes this possible.
Remove the false estimation, and I thereby remove the empty desire. Complaints and condemnations just compound the problem, entrenching me in my stubbornness and further irritating my passions. If it is in the past, no resentment will change this. If it is in the present, no griping will remove it. If it is truly unbearable, it will soon be over and done with.
We laugh at the Black Knight when he exclaims, “’Tis but a scratch!”, but the scene would have been pitiful if he had only started griping. There is humor here because fortitude can look like denial on the outside, if it isn’t accompanied by wisdom on the inside. How much of the suffering is in the actual circumstances, and how much is solely from our own imaginings? An honest answer to the question will rightly leave us humbled.
I might assume that the fear of pain is the biggest threat I face, and yet I will often willingly endure a pain in the hope of a future pleasure. But what if that pleasure is not to come, and the gratification of the senses is forever denied me? What would be the point to a life without the reward of such a satisfaction?
My problem is a confusion about causes and consequences: let me remember to judge the value of the pleasure by the action from which it proceeds. Though the man in the street is unlikely to have heard of David Hume, it is his disordered view of the human person that haunts our contemporary attitudes, such that we take reason to be a slave of the passions, and we measure the good by whatever indulges our subjective desires.
Once I center upon the virtues, with the perfection of my nature as a creature of mind and of will, I am then able to find a genuine joy in the best form of character. Let the appetites have their say, and then let an understanding have the final say. Our cravings would like to trick us into thinking that they must always be satiated, while an awareness of our nature gently reminds us why the good life asks to receive so very little, and it can tolerate so very much.
With a touch of patience and a broader perspective, observe how many of the things we insist that we need are nothing more than diversions, far more likely to become curses instead of blessings. Desire, like pain, has a way of burning out quickly, and then we see how foolish our petty obsessions have really been.
The slightest practice in self-discipline proves why no luxury is ever a necessity; our frenzied longing only proves how we are grasping for substitutes to our own inner worth.
Today I was frustrated when the internet connection went out, and yesterday I grumbled about a delayed Amazon order. And yet when I was younger, neither option was even on the table, and I still managed to happily make it through my day. The want is the result of a mindless habit, and a conscious adjustment in my thinking about meaning and value has the power to correct such bad habits.
Most pleasures are superficial, most pains are bearable, and a commitment to conscience is what makes this possible.
Remove the false estimation, and I thereby remove the empty desire. Complaints and condemnations just compound the problem, entrenching me in my stubbornness and further irritating my passions. If it is in the past, no resentment will change this. If it is in the present, no griping will remove it. If it is truly unbearable, it will soon be over and done with.
We laugh at the Black Knight when he exclaims, “’Tis but a scratch!”, but the scene would have been pitiful if he had only started griping. There is humor here because fortitude can look like denial on the outside, if it isn’t accompanied by wisdom on the inside. How much of the suffering is in the actual circumstances, and how much is solely from our own imaginings? An honest answer to the question will rightly leave us humbled.
—Reflection written in 11/2013
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